MAVEN Mars Mission

MAVEN to Mars! Watch the Launch From All Angles

MAVEN's mission to Mars is officially a go! The robotic explorer was sent into space aboard an Atlas V rocket earlier today from the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida. In about 10 months, the Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution (MAVEN) spacecraft will reach Mars, which it will orbit for nearly one Earth year while collecting important data about the planet's climate and atmosphere.

Using data collected from eight scientific instruments aboard MAVEN, researchers may be able to find out what happened to the water on Mars. Has the liquid been absorbed into the soil, or did it dissipate into the atmosphere? If you missed MAVEN's liftoff, relive the Red Planet-bound spacecraft's launch from all angles.

ANY LIFE ON MARS CAME FROM EARTH
In the Earth's past there was powerful volcanic activity which could have easily spewed dirt and rocks containing microbes into outer space which not only could have eventually reached Mars but also ended up traveling in orbit through space that we now know as meteors. A Newsweek article of September 21, 1998, p.12 mentions exactly this possibility. "We think there's about 7 million tons of earth soil sitting on Mars", says scientist and evolutionist Kenneth Nealson. "You have to consider the possibility that if we find life on Mars, it could have come from the Earth" [Weingarten, T., Newsweek, September 21, 1998, p.12].
HAVING THE RIGHT CONDITIONS AND RAW MATERIALS FOR LIFE doesn't mean that life can originate by chance.
Proteins can't come into existence unless there's life first! Miller, in his famous experiment in 1953, showed that individual amino acids (the building blocks of life) could come into existence by chance. But, it's not enough just to have amino acids. The various amino acids that make-up life must link together in a precise sequence, just like the letters in a sentence, to form functioning protein molecules. If they're not in the right sequence the protein molecules won't work. It has never been shown that various amino acids can bind together into a sequence by chance to form protein molecules. Even the simplest cell is made up of many millions of various protein molecules.
The probability of just an average size protein molecule arising by chance is 10 to the 65th power. Mathematicians have said any event in the universe with odds of 10 to 50th power or greater is impossible! The late great British scientist Sir Frederick Hoyle calculated that the odds of even the simplest cell coming into existence by chance is 10 to the 40,000th power! How large is this? Consider that the total number of atoms in our universe is 10 to the 23rd power.
Also, what many don't realize is that Miller had a laboratory apparatus that shielded and protected the individual amino acids the moment they were formed, otherwise the amino acids would have quickly disintegrated and been destroyed in the mix of random energy and forces involved in Miller's experiment.
There is no innate chemical tendency for the various amino acids to bond with one another in a sequence. Any one amino acid can just as easily bond with any other. The only reason at all for why the various amino acids bond with one another in a precise sequence in the cells of our bodies is because they're directed to do so by an already existing sequence of molecules found in our genetic code.
Of course, once you have a complete and living cell then the genetic code and
biological machinery exist to direct the formation of more cells, but how could life or the cell have naturally originated when no directing code and mechanisms existed in nature? Read my Internet article: HOW FORENSIC SCIENCE REFUTES ATHEISM.
A partially evolved cell would quickly disintegrate under the effects of random forces of the environment, especially without the protection of a complete and fully functioning cell membrane. A partially evolved cell cannot wait millions of years for chance to make it complete and living! In fact, it couldn't have even
reached the partially evolved state.
Please read my popular Internet articles listed below:
ANY LIFE ON MARS CAME FROM EARTH,
SCIENCE AND THE ORIGIN OF LIFE,
NATURAL LIMITS OF EVOLUTION,
HOW FORENSIC SCIENCE REFUTES ATHEISM,
WAR AMONG EVOLUTIONISTS (2nd Edition),
NO HALF-EVOLVED DINOSAURS,
HOW DID MY DNA MAKE ME?
DOES GOD PARTICLE EXPLAIN UNIVERSE'S ORIGIN?
Visit my newest Internet site: THE SCIENCE SUPPORTING CREATION
Sincerely,
Babu G. Ranganathan*
(B.A. theology/biology)
Author of popular Internet article, TRADITIONAL DOCTRINE OF HELL EVOLVED FROM GREEK ROOTS
* I have had the privilege of being recognized in the 24th edition of Marquis "Who's Who In The East" for my writings on religion and science, and I have given successful lectures (with question and answer time afterwards) defending creation from science before evolutionist science faculty and students at various colleges and universities.